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The AWMS issue - A symptom of the larger Sierra Leone issue

 - Monday 18 February 2013.

 

Opinion

By Imodale Caulker-Burnett, USA.

During the debates over the controversy regarding the location of the Annie Walsh Memorial School, as an Old Girl of the school, I added my voice. It occurred to me that the Annie Walsh issue was really one symptom of a larger problem which the country must deal with.

If one considers the location of most of the schools (maybe with the exception of the Grammar School, the Collegiate School, and the Methodist Girls High School) , there are crowds of traders around most of them. If the argument is that the vicinity around the school is packed with market people, and it is therefore no longer conducive for learning, and that building a ‘Markit’ (according to Professor Blake), is the alternative, then all other schools are in danger of going the way of the Annie Walsh. The Albert Academy and the Government Model School, are examples of crowded environments. The bottom of Berry Street is loaded with markets, and Okada and Taxi stands. A new highway even runs parallel to the Albert Academy encroaching on the campus.

Yes, there is a serious need for re-planning the city of Freetown, but we must always have in the forefront of our planning, the preservation of our historical monuments both in Freetown and in the Provinces, for the benefit of future generations. (This will also benefit the Tourism business, as visitors are always interested in the history of the country they are visiting.)

Regardless of what is finally decided about the AWMS, we need to begin a dialogue with each other, and with the powers that be in the government, in order to seriously discuss the future of Sierra Leone. I think it is time to take a look at our history and determine how it has impacted where the country is today, and where we want to go from here.

Freetown, Annie Walsh Memorial School

I would argue that the division of the country into Colony and Protectorate in the early days, (when the British purchased the Peninsular, for the newly arriving Freed Slaves, then annexed the rest of the country as a Protectorate) is the source of the problem and is where we must begin. I would also argue that our problems have little to do with which party is in power, but much to do with the limited education the colonialists provided in the provinces in comparison with that which existed in the colony at that time, as well as the quality of education offered today. With the exception of schools like the Bunumbu Teachers College, the Harford School for Girls, the Magburaka Secondary school and Bo Secondary School, there were precious few other schools in the provinces and not everyone went to school then, (not everyone goes to school even today). African History was not taught in any school in those days, and neither was Sierra Leone History. As a result, up until the late 1960’s and early 1970’s, but for people like the late Dr. M.C.F. Easmon, who established the Freetown Museum and took students in Freetown, on a few tours of historical sites such as the Banana islands and Bunce island, many of us knew nothing of African or Sierra Leone history. Not many people from Freetown had been to the provinces, and indeed, many of the provincials knew even less about Freetown.

In the Old days, as far as the provincials were concerned, the Colony was ‘Sierra Leone,’ which they saw as different from their various ‘Countries’. When Independence came, with the ‘Majority Rule’ of Democracy, whether we liked it or not, the country was primarily ruled by those from the provinces, with their limited education and limited knowledge of Freetown. In my opinion, many of them were not really well equipped. The fact is, the way things are done in the provinces is very different from the way things are done in Freetown. Now with the Rebel war, (which brought many of the provincial people to Freetown for safety, and caused an exodus of many of the ‘colonial’ people – the Krios, as well as many of our educated elite,) the Colony and the Provinces have finally merged and we are not prepared for it on any level. But we must find a way and be willing to merge the two.

We have to have ‘Wan Wod’ in order to solve our problems We cannot now begin to talk as if we are ‘One Country’. WE ARE NOT YET ONE COUNTRY. That does not happen automatically, and it will not happen by one Tribe looking down on the other, nor will it happen by criticism from the Diaspora who are 6,000 miles away, and can only visit home infrequently. It will also not happen if the statistics are still showing that 80% of the population is illiterate.

We have a long way to go before we get there. But we have to begin somewhere. In order to develop a vision for our country, we must begin by respecting our differences and learning about each other, and determining how we see ourselves as Sierra Leoneans, (not as one tribe or the other, or one party or the other) but as one country and one people. There are some of us who are of mixed culture – children of Colony/Provincial parentage, and we may have the advantage of being familiar with both cultures. We should be part of the dialogue and the process of building a Sierra Leone which we can be proud of.

 

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